By TimesLedger Staff
As Winter Storm Stella wound down Tuesday afternoon, residents in Woodside were busy running snowblowers and wading through the wet snow that packed sidewalks as well as street crossings.
Over in Woodhaven there were very few people on streets on Jamaica Avenue, where the streets were cleared. The occasional plow truck ambled down the thoroughfares, which had barely any traffic.
“I guess it hasn’t been that bad compared to others,” said Pablo Cueva, the superintendent at an apartment building near 52nd Street and Skillman Avenue. “We had it worse, I guess. We got more inches of snow. I’m mean it’s a blizzard and there’s ice. You have to be cautious of this.”
But it turned out not to be a blizzard after all and Mayor Bill de Blasio was asked at a news conference to defend his decision to shutter public schools for the day.
The National Weather Service was forecasting a blizzard as late as 4 a.m. this morning, but the prediction was downgraded to a winter storm advisory several hours later. As much as 8 inches of snow, sleet and rain was expected to have fallen by the end of the day.
Wind gusts as high as 50 miles an hour were blasting through the city and adding to the treacherous conditions on the borough’s icy streets as the mercury dropped.
The Weather Service was calling for as much as 17 inches of snow to fall on Queens when the massive nor’easter shifted direction north and west of the city, dropping 15 inches on Yack just an hour away.
New York was spared somewhat, but by Tuesday afternoon nearly 15 million people were under a blizzard warning in the region, CNN reported.
The mayor said the state of emergency will remain in effect in the city until 8 p.m. Tuesday. Asked whether he regretted his decision to close city schools, the mayor told a news conference at noon Tuesday that despite City Hall’s relying on the National Weather Service’s model, it was clear that “Mother Nature makes her own decisions.”
De Blasio said by midday 87 percent of all streets in the city had been salted and 96 percent of the street had been sanded at least once.
Underground subways were running and service of the above ground lines – the No. 7, the J and the A in Queens – will resume at 6 p.m. Tuesday night. The MTA also announced limited service will resume on Metro-North, which stopped running at noon Tuesday.
There was no immediate information when service would be restored. The Long Island Rail Road was operating on a weekend schedule with some cancellations. The MTA pointed out that anti-freeze trains were at work to spray de-icer on the third rail to keep the LIRR running.
Metro-North trains were halted at noon because of heavy snowfall north of the city. City bus service was running but on a curtailed basis.
At LaGuardia, 99 percent of flights were canceled Tuesday, according to the Port Authority, and hundreds were taken off the board at Kennedy Airport, but most flights were fully booked Wednesday.
With far less snow piled on the streets than expected, the cleanup should be quicker. The mayor urged New Yorkers to keep their cars off the streets so that the Sanitation Department could finish removing the snow and ice.
Alternate side of the street parking was canceled for both Tuesday and Wednesday, but the meters are working.
Asked about the homeless, de Blasio said the city’s Code Blue policy extended full outreach to all the people living outdoors and about 60 people came in voluntarily. Three who refused were taken to hospitals to be evaluated by medical personnel.
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Mark Hallum and Gina Martinez contributed to this report
